Unless otherwise indicated herein, the materials described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Portable computing devices such as personal computers, laptop computers, tablet computers, smart phones, wearable computers, and countless types of Internet-capable devices are prevalent in numerous aspects of modern life. For example, it is common for a single consumer to operate a smart phone, a laptop computer, a keyboard, and a mouse, possibly simultaneously. With increasing consumers of multiple portable devices, the demand for wireless technology continues to play a role in the use of such portable devices. As such, various forms of wireless technology have evolved to locally connect these portable devices for numerous applications. One short-range wireless technology standard for exchanging data between multiple portable devices is popularly known as Bluetooth.
Bluetooth is commonly used for wirelessly connecting a portable device with one or more other portable devices over a short range. For example, Bluetooth may be used to connect a cell phone to a wireless headset, possibly allowing for hands-free use of the phone. In some instances, Bluetooth may also be used to connect the cell phone to the audio speakers and a microphone of a motor vehicle, possibly allowing for hands-free use of the phone while operating the vehicle. In multiple applications, Bluetooth remains particularly attractive due to its low-cost solutions and protocols designed for low power consumption.
Bluetooth low energy (Bluetooth LE or BLE, sometimes referred to as Bluetooth Smart) is an extension of the Bluetooth standard that was merged into the Bluetooth standard in 2010. The BLE standard also enables radio frequency communication between various types of devices, and is aimed at novel applications in the healthcare, fitness, security, and home entertainment industries. As the name implies, the BLE standard is intended to provide considerably reduced power consumption and cost as compared to the original Bluetooth standard. For example, the BLE standard is designed to enable wireless connectivity with small devices running on a watch battery or button cell.
One particular portion of the BLE standard is the advertiser/scanner model that allows a device to discover nearby devices, broadcast information for discovery by nearby devices, or form a connection with another device. The BLE standard provides for forty physical channels operating within the 2.4 GHz Industrial, Scientific, & Medical (ISM) band. Three of the channels are designated for use as advertising channels, while the remaining thirty-seven channels are designated for use as data channels. Bluetooth devices may transmit and receive data in packets on the advertising channels using a Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) scheme. Devices that transmit data packets on the advertising channels are referred to as “advertisers”. And devices that receive data packets on the channels are referred to as “scanners”.